Due to instinct we love and take care of our children, due to instinct we separate from them and in such a way allow them to seek mature lives of their own. Unfortunately, we are not in tune with our instincts and with other species and the conflict which appears between love and the inevitable separation causes many emotional difficulties. There are times when we feel we hate our teens. There are moments when our children feel they hate us, their parents. We all know that hate is wrong and hating makes us feel terrible about ourselves.
Almost all parents acquainted with situation when parenting an out of control child we even can roar and slap them hard as wild lions. The fact that we are not wild lions in Africa does not prevent us from feeling this way from time to time, it only prevents us from acting on that impulse. The same human conscience that prevents us from acting on that impulse, slaps us about the head for feeling that way in the first place.
All right, but there was that one time that he ticked you off so hard that before you even knew it you had lashed out and slapped him. Yes, yes, yes you're right, this was not the best way to deal with the situation. And you would be correct in acknowledging that you would benefit from some anger control and prevention strategies. Besides, you should learn how to avoid such responses in the future. But it does not make you an atrocious serial killer.
In actual fact, the fear of being shamed prevents us from making lots of extreme errors. Nevertheless, past a certain point, shame can be totally counter productive. Shame can prevent us from forgiving ourselves enough to acknowledge our problems and ask for help. Misplaced shame can prevent us from seeking help for our out of control children.
Consider several questions:
- Have you ever been mistreated by a stranger?
- Have you ever been yelled at in the office?
- Have you ever been treated impolitely in traffic?
- Can you say that you were overwhelmed by warm, fuzzy feelings when this happened?
- Did you feel bad about not loving these unlovable people?
Parents love their out of control teens only for the reason they are our children. We feel horrible when we cannot love our unlovable child. We are expecting too much of ourselves and forget that our children are just humans.
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